We're so alike You and Me
by mcgonagalls-biscuits
Summary: Cute fluff with a hint of angst' DracoHarry pairing NO graphic detail. Just a cute little one shot!COMPLETE


Usual Disclaimer: Unfortunately this world and its wonderful inhabitants do not belong to me, they belong to J. K. Rowling, I'm just borrowing them. I am making no money from this it is purely for the enjoyment of those few who choose to read it. Thanks J. K. for lending me your ready made world of magic.

A/N : This is a one off piece of pure fluff(i.e. no plot whatsoever). For the sake of placing it in a time frame, lets just say they are now in seventh year and the flashbacks refer to the summer after their sixth year. Text in _italics_ refer to flashbacks and _'italics' _are the letters they wrote. Hope its clear. This is just a little scene that wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it down so I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Please R&R and let me know if you like it!!!

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We're so alike. You and me.

'I knew it. I knew he'd come.' The blonde headed Slytherin thought smugly to himself as he stood under his favourite tree by the lake watching the dark figure in the distance make his way painfully slowly towards him.

'Damn it!' There was that feeling again. Nerves? Butterflies? 'Why?'

He took a long, calming drag on his cigarette. As the figure drew closer, the blonde took in every detail of his form. The determined nature of his walk, the way his cloak rippled around him in the cool September breeze, his height which, it was obvious, even at a distance, had increased again over the summer. His messy jet-black hair, also being slightly swept by the breeze, was longer and his face and build were no longer those of an immature teenager, but were now those of a young man. As the figure came within a few feet of him, the blonde took another nervous draw on his cigarette.

"Aren't we the rebel Malfoy?" The figure criticised, although without any real animosity, as he approached.

'Don't say anything stupid.' Draco thought quickly to himself. "No rules about it." He replied in his usual, scathing manner.

"Since when did you pick up muggle habits anyway?" He asked, stepping beside the blonde and leaning against the tree.

"Since they locked father up and sent mother and me into hiding." He stated, his face emotionless as he took another draw on his cigarette before offering it to the other boy. 

To his surprise it was accepted and he waited for the other boy to cough and splutter at his first cigarette. The sound did not arrive though as the other boy took a long, smooth draw and passed it back.

"Don't look so surprised." A wry smile passed the boys lips.

"Not such a goody goody after all, eh Potter?"

"Never have been, I just don't make a habit of getting caught."

***

Harry fought the urge to laugh out loud at the look of surprise on Draco's face when he accepted the cigarette, and his even further surprise when he did not choke on it. Harry knew he had expected it, Harry knew how his mind worked. 

***

Minutes passed in silence as they passed the cigarette back and forth, both boys contemplating the events of the summer.

***

Harry took in every detail of the blonde, he was so very skinny, and not surprisingly after the rough summer he'd had. His blonde hair was like pure spun silk; not one strand lay out of place despite the breeze. His flawless skin and hair showed no signs that he had just had the worst summer of his life, not that any of the previous ones had been great either. His skin was of alabaster and his eyes were like nothing Harry had ever seen. When Draco was himself they were shining silver grey, reflecting the light that hit them with an energy that inspired those around them with intense emotion. In the most part though, they were dull, like dark, stormy rain clouds as he shielded himself from those whom he called 'friends'. Harry could see past the rain though, and into the soul that held the shining silver sparkle that longed to surface. Harry could see Draco. The essence that filled him. And Harry knew Draco was not who he made out to be. He knew he and Draco had so much in common.

They were so alike. He and Draco.

***

Draco took the last draw from the cigarette and put it out underfoot. Still they stood in a strangely comfortable silence.

***

__

*Flashback*

"Aren't I lucky? Harry muttered to himself as he got up from his bed and from staring at the ceiling. He made his way to the window to let the owl in who was delivering his first letter of the summer. His first letter. 'It only took them ten days.' He had thought bitterly to himself. He didn't recognise the owl, which took off again after having the letter removed from its leg. The handwriting wasn't one he recognised either.

'Harry,

I expect you've heard about father. He is where he belongs - Azkaban. Mother and I are in hiding and I take a great risk in sending this letter so please do not disregard it and it's contents. For your peace of mind, I have not and will_ not join 'them'. I have not and will not for one reason alone - you. You cannot die at the expense of the wizarding world. It may seem strange to be receiving a letter from me of all people but I assure you it is with the best of intentions and with no ulterior motives that I write to you. I need your help and in return you should have my eternal gratitude and assistance whenever you should need it. I am begging you for help, yes 'I' am begging 'you' for help._

I trust you know who I am.'

Harry read and re-read the letter a thousand times. There was only one person it could be from, but that wasn't possible. Was it?

The reply he sent was a simple one and cautious too.

'No, I had not heard but I shall not pretend that the news saddens me. I am however surprised to be hearing the news from yourself. 'Best of intentions' and 'no ulterior motives' are phrases which, although well meant, still do not fill me with confidence. With all due respect, I have no proof that you are who you hint you are or that you are not already on the other side. I take it that this correspondence has more meaning than just idle gossip. What is it exactly that you want, and why my help specifically?

HP.'

*End Flashback*

"So what is it you wanted Malfoy? I'm not standing here for the good of my health."

"I wanted to find out where we stand." Harry searched his face looking for an indication of what his answer should be. 

__

*Flashback*

'I need your help specifically because you are the only one I can trust, strange as that may sound. I need you to save me from myself. I cannot guarantee that I will return to Hogwarts in one piece this year. Mother and I have been split up and I am alone. Not that this is any different to any other time. I have always been alone. Will you help me? I hope you are sufficiently convinced of my identity after this letter.

The Bouncing Ferret.'

***

'Okay so you are who you say you are. I am still unsure of what you are asking of me - your letters are somewhat cryptic. How am I to know that you are trustworthy? Why are you taking such a risk in writing to me?'

***

'I am asking for a truce between ourselves. I can give you my word and my word alone that I am trustworthy. I have no one to take orders from, Father is in Azkaban and I am not marked. What do you want me to do to prove myself?'

***

'I want your word that you will not betray me. I hope it is enough.'

***

'You have my word and my eternal gratitude.

Thank you.'

As Harry unrolled the last note, something fell into his hand, a small lock of platinum blonde hair.

*End Flashback*

"Where do you want us to stand?" Harry asked cryptically. Raising a hand to his neck where he fingered the locket which was hidden under his robes.

"I don't know."

"You initiated all this Malfoy, what is it you want?"

"I don't know."

"Well as far as I am concerned, the truce still stands unless you'd prefer to return to being enemies."

"No! That's the last thing I want!"

"Well then, what's the first thing you want?"

'You.' Draco's mind screamed but his lips did not move.

__

*Flashback*

'I trust you. Despite all odds I trust you. You have the strangest effect on me.'

***

Harry's mysterious reply had warmed him beautifully, despite the freezing temperatures, his numb fingers and blue lips. 

He laid it on top of the pile of all the letters he had received from Harry. He was down to his last piece of parchment and he began composing his own letter, willing his fingers to thaw sufficiently to allow him to write. 

He was relieved that he had brought his best quill with him, it was charmed so that the ink would not run out for several years at least. A small amount of parchment, his quill, two cartons of cigarettes, his wand (although of little use to him as any use of it would allow him to be traced, let alone the illegality of it) and a small amount of food were all that he had brought, all that he had been allowed to bring. 

He was glad of his decision to bring parchment because he decided that he would most definitely have gone mad without someone to talk to. He had debated who to write to at first, his mind had gone through all the possibilities, none of whom would have been in the slightest bit appropriate or trustworthy. 

He had spent hours contemplating why his mind screamed at him to contact Harry. 'Why Harry?' He had asked himself over and over. 'Because you can trust him. Because he is the only one who will understand.'

They were so alike, he and Harry.

'I knew you would understand. I don't know how I knew but something told me you would. Let me ask you a question. Is there a little voice inside your head telling you to trust me, telling you not to push me away? I hate to be asking this, not because it is you but because I hate being dependent on anyone. Is there any chance you could send me a few things? Namely some food, parchment, some matches and a jumper maybe? Thank you for not rejecting me for I surely would have died without your correspondence. I hope you know that you are not just the saviour of the wizarding world but you have been mine also.'

He sent off the letter and was relieved when an answer came the very next day, a package accompanied it, containing a sealed container of foods such as bread, cheese, nutritional cereal and so on. I was obvious that Harry had put some amount of thought into what he'd sent.

The letter, which accompanied it, said:

'I never said I understood, but I think I am beginning to. I know all too much of the little voice you spoke of. It tells me to trust you but I know not why. I believe it though. I hope am doing the right thing. I have sent some food, with this owl but another package will follow shortly with the rest of what you asked for. It's about time you found some one to depend on when you need to. I felt the same way when I found my godfather. Why me though?'

*End flashback*

There were minutes of silence between them. 

"You're intriguing Malfoy. The Malfoy I see now is not the one who wrote to me this summer and I want to know why. No, don't answer, let me guess."

It was less of a guess but more of a mirror of Harry himself. "The you everyone else sees is one which you have created to shield people from who you really are. You are afraid, Malfoy, afraid that people would not accept you for you, afraid they will find out you're not so _'evil' _after all. You're the Slytherin Ice Prince and son of a Deatheater because you are expected to be and no less. Now, you are unsure of how to act. How to act around people in general. How to act around your housemates because you do not want them to suspect you are not who you have pretended to be for so long. How to act around me because I seem to know you so well."

When Harry finished, his eyes were burning into Draco's soul through his shining silver orbs, seeing all that Draco had ever hidden from the world.

'How does he do that?' Draco thought, incapable of forming coherent words and trying to fight back overwhelmed tears. 

"We're so alike. You and me." Harry said, shifting his gaze to look out across the lake. He knew he had made Draco uneasy but he couldn't help it. That was the way things were and with Draco, found himself incapable of keeping his thoughts, feelings and emotions under wraps as well as he should.

"We are, aren't we?" It was more of a statement than a question but Harry nodded slightly anyway.

__

*Flashback* 

"Oh the irony." Draco muttered to himself a he opened the second package to find a deep red jumper with the Gryffindor Lion emblazoned on the front. He pulled it on anyway; feeling warmth spread through him not just from the wool of the jumper but from the faint smell which emanated from it. It smelled like Harry, It made Draco nostalgic. He would have given anything to be back home, at Hogwarts, with his enemy. Strange as it sounded, their encounters were what he enjoyed most about school. Their banter was amusing. There was no real enmity behind their words but neither would admit to it and instead pretended, with all their might, to hate one another. He smiled slightly to himself and began a reply.

'Ha ha. Very funny, but you ought to know that I am wearing it anyway, despite your futile attempt at humour. Everything is very much appreciated but I'm afraid you are wrong about my dependency issues. I do not need to depend on you, it just so happens that I need your help for the time being. I'm sure it will all change when we return to Hogwarts, who could possibly understand this... whatever it is we're doing writing to each other?'

***

'Don't deny it. I know you need me and I know you know you need me. That little nagging voice tells me so. Why, if you yourself do not know the reason, are we writing to each other? You tell me, for your letters tend to contradict themselves. One minute you tell me you need me and the next you don't. If I remember correctly you were the one to ask for my help in the first place. I think you're losing it. I wish I knew where you were and that you are okay. I don't particularly want a case of insanity on my hands. As for change... do you want things to change when we return to Hogwarts?'

***

'I agree, I think it is highly possible that I am going mad. One minute I wish to be saved, the next all I want is to curl up and die. If I cannot decipher my own thoughts then what chance have you? I feel like a lost soul sometimes and is then I feel I need you, then sometimes, my upbringing returns to me and I wonder what the Hell I'm doing writing to you. I need you in the sense that you are all that is keeping me sane right now and I can't stop needing you. And now I'm wondering why I am telling you all this and I am wondering if I shall send this at all. I don't know if I want things to change again, but I don't think we have a choice. We both know what is expected of us. Maybe we should just get on with it? I do need you, I think... Writing this down has seemed like lifting a weight from my shoulders but I doubt that my ramblings make any sense, must be the cold temperature effecting my brain.

I want to know something... Do you hate me? 

***

'Thank you for that... interesting insight into your wonderfully muddled mind As you say, I have very little chance of deciphering your muddled thoughts but I'm trying (Merlin knows why) and I get the general gist of them. I think. You need me but part of you is in denial of that. I'm still trying to get over the whole - ' 'you' need 'me' ' thing let alone the 'you keep me sane' thing. We've gone from practical strangers to 'old friends' in such a short space of time. I find myself wondering why we are sharing all this with one another but I also find myself unable to stop. I've got to say that you have made me think a lot this summer, about our face-offs since first year. Some of them were quite funny weren't they? I remember our first journey on the Express, do you remember? Sometimes I wonder what it would be like if I hadn't rejected you, if I had let myselfbe sorted into Slytherin like the hat wanted. Do you ever wonder what it would be like if we had been friends from the beginning?

And no, I don't hate you. I never have. Do you hate me?'

***

'You should have been a Slytherin, I always thought that.

I remember it all and have wondered much the same. I always thought we should have been friends but I expect fate had other ideas for us. 

I used to think I hated you but now I'm not sure. It was beaten into me that you were the 'enemy of our side' and while part of me believed this, the rest of me screamed that I was wrong. I just ignored it.'

*End Flashback*

"So where do we go from here? It would be a shame to dismiss everything that happened over the summer." Harry questioned. 

"I suppose. Do you think this was fate or do you think we defied it to get here?" Draco asked cryptically. 

"I break every other rule, why not tempt fate?" Harry grinned. He felt so comfortable and at ease with Draco, he felt no need to raise his usual barriers. He felt at ease with Ron and Hermione too but he wanted to protect them from the pain he carried around with him. With Draco it was different, the shared a similar burden and felt no need to hide.

"Do you feel strange? With me I mean?"

"As in, feeling weird that we can be ourselves when we can't with anyone else in the world. As in feeling weird to be standing so close to your archenemy and not making snide comments or throwing punches or hexes?"

Again, Harry was unnervingly spot on and Draco was lost for words.

"You're creepy sometimes, d'you know that Potter."

"Enough with the 'Potter' crap Draco." Harry extended his hand, grinning cheekily. "I'm Harry, how do you do."

Draco smirked, accepting his hand and shaking it. "You're weird, Harry." Draco loved the way the word Harry rolled off his tongue. He had often whispered the name to himself when he was in hiding, it had comforted him, along with the jumper Harry had sent him.

"Nobody ever said I was normal." Harry was still grinning and Draco couldn't help but smile back.

"Wow." Harry muttered and his grin turned to a look of amazement. "You know, you should smile more often, you might win an award."

"Oh god that was cheesy! Are you... Were you...Coming onto me?" Draco raised his eyebrows.

"Maybe Malfoy, Maybe." Harry said and he leaned towards Draco, putting one hand on the tree trunk behind him so that they were face to face, inches apart.

"Do you want me to?"

Draco tore his eyes away from the emeralds that once again looked into his very core, a place where he had always hoped nobody would ever see, and yet it felt as though his heart wanted Harry there, seeing every fibre of his being, so there was nothing hidden between them.

"I thought we were on first name terms?" 

"Don't change the subject, Draco. I'll ask again, the question I came here to ask. What do you want?"

"I want...." Oh god this was so hard. Why was this so hard to say? There were no longer any secrets between them, and at times it seemed that they were one and the same person. So why was it so hard? 'What if he doesn't feel the same?' A voice niggled but then there came the voice of reason. 'You know he does, so what are you waiting for? Why is he here if he doesn't want what you want.' Then came the niggling again. 'But what do you want exactly? You don't even know.' 

There was no more time for his inner battle with reason as he found his eyes locked with Harry's again and his mouth opened to answer before he could think anymore.

"You." 

He closed his eyes and waited for the rejection but instead, he felt warm soft lips brush against his own and his eyes flew open again. Harry was still leaning against the tree, leaning over Draco who was only an inch or so smaller than him but felt smaller. There were a few inches of space between their bodies but when Draco moved to meet Harry's lips again, their bodies were brought together with an urgent force and Draco was pushed back against the tree as they shared a hungry and long awaited kiss. Enjoying the feel of their bodies flush against one another, and the feel of Harry's fingers in his hair and his exploring tongue in his mouth, Draco moaned deeply. He had waited so long and was not disappointed. Draco could smell Harry, the same smell he had inhaled deeply from the jumper Harry had sent to him, the jumper he had kept under his pillow when he returned to Hogwarts. It wasn't so mush a smell of deodorant or suchlike, but more the smell of his hair, his shampoo maybe, his soap and just his general scent. They pulled their swollen pink lips apart minutes later and looked at one another. Maybe it wasn't going to be a bad year after all Draco thought, as Harry's mouth worked its way along his jaw line and down onto the tender nape of his neck. All worries of his fathers imminent escape from Azkaban and whether his mother was ok or not, flew out his mind and he knew that his Harry would stand by him and be there for him through it all. Call it intuition or that little voice in his head, but he knew that he and Harry would never be parted from now on.

***

Harry explored every crevice of Draco's mouth with his tongue before making his acquaintance with his jaw and neck. He had waited so long to touch the perfect platinum hair and the flawless skin, to kiss the appealing soft pink lips, to search in those pools of silver for the Draco he knew was there, and to claim his perfect form as his own. Now, he knew, it was his, and always would be.

***

There was one letter Harry never sent. He had written it just before they were due to return to school. He had kept it though.

It said:

'_Draco,_

I wish you were here in the warm with me. I have longed to tell you this for an age it seems. You have been the rock in my life this summer and that is something I will always be grateful for. You made me feel like I was at least something important to you, while everyone else left me to be beaten by my Uncle - and they knew it - but still, they feel it's better to keep me out of the way at summer. That way there's less danger for them and I agree. All I've ever wanted to do was protect them but I still put them in danger just by being me. You risked your life to write to me and I want you to know that I cried when you said I'd stopped you from killing yourself. You never said it in those many word but I understood. I understood you all too well and now I don't think I could live without you in my life.

I want you here where I can protect you, I want you to be mine as I would be yours if you asked me to be.

Your Harry.'

***

Making his way home was the most gruelling task Draco had ever experienced or was ever likely to, but he had managed to write one more letter. A letter that he never sent.

It said:

_'Harry,_

You have been my saviour this summer, the thought of you has kept me sane and more importantly, alive. You have my eternal gratitude for this and I hope that we will not return to the animosity of previous years when I return. (If I survive the journey). When I return, I shall be a dangerous person to know, but I know you will understand this. I know you protect your friends with those expert shields, I'm pretty good at them myself. I want you for my own, Harry Potter. Could you live with a person like me? I admire your purity and know I have nothing of the sort. I find myself hoping you will be able to see past who I have pretended to be all along and see who I have wanted to be. Things are never as they seem and I know you understand that.

Could you... would you be mine? I'd be yours if I thought you'd ask.

Your Dragon.'

***

"We're so alike, You and me." Harry said for the second time that day, as he linked his hand with Draco's and they began walking back to the castle. Harry pulling a golden locket from under his robes and lying it on the top of his robes for the world to see. 

Draco smiled, seeing a few strands of white blonde hair poking out from the side of the locket. Harry had kept him by his heart all this time.

"Like two halves of a whole."

Draco's smiling silver orbs met Harry's shining emeralds as they bravely entered the castle, heading towards the great hall, bracing themselves for the uproar, but feeling ready to face the world. Together.


End file.
